Merchant Advisory Group Reaches 100-Member Milestone — Association Attributes Rapid Growth to Value of Collaboration and Education
Minneapolis, MN (PRWEB) December 10, 2015 -- The Merchant Advisory Group (MAG) announced its membership reached 100 merchants this week. The trade association for merchants has experienced rapid growth, reaching this significant membership milestone in just seven years.
“We are pleased to recognize this important milestone and the achievement of a goal set forth by the Board five years ago,” says MAG Chairman Lee Jurgens. “I’m personally gratified that so many merchants have recognized the importance of working together to ensure the merchant community of having a voice in payments. Prior to the MAG, the merchant community was pretty much taken for granted, but I think it’s beginning to change, partly as a result of MAG’s efforts,” Jurgens explained.
The MAG was founded in 2008 by a small visionary group of merchants in the payments field. Today, with a 16 percent increase in membership in 2015, the MAG is in league with just 13 percent of trade associations creating that level of membership growth*. “We've come a long way” says MAG Treasurer Chris Priebe, Southwest Airlines. “I recall being ecstatic with 25 merchants showing up to our first conference. Having grown four times that in seven years shows our value proposition to merchants continues to be top notch,” Priebe added.
Today MAG’s 100-member organization work to drive positive change in payments through multi-stakeholder collaboration. “We bring together all stakeholders involved in today’s issues so concerns can be heard and effectively addressed,” says Jurgens.
The organization also provides valuable education and resources for members including monthly webinars on hot topics and tools such as a new CyberRisk Hub, a web-based resource to assist MAG members in effectively managing cyber risks.
The MAG’s work this past year includes creation of white papers on Merchant Requirements on Tokenization, Debit Cost and a draft Mobile Product Analysis Document and growth of its international collaboration. “We feel strongly merchants need to coordinate efforts on payments across the globe and we’re exploring how we can work more closely with our international colleagues,” says Mark Horwedel, MAG chief executive officer.
- 2015 Membership Benchmarking Report – Marketing General
About the Merchant Advisory Group
The Merchant Advisory Group (MAG) was founded in 2008 by a small visionary group of merchants in the payments field dedicated to driving positive change in payments through multi-stakeholder collaboration. Today, the MAG represents over 100 of the largest U.S. merchants who account for nearly $2.6 Trillion in annual sales at over 430,000 locations across the U.S. and online. Roughly $1.5 Trillion of those sales are electronic representing over 41 Billion card payments. MAG members employ nearly 11.5 million associates.
Amy Sellheim, Merchant Advisory Group, http://www.merchantadvisorygroup.org, +1 (952) 928-4648, [email protected]
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